The Islamabad High Court is currently hearing PML-N supremo Nawaz Sharif’s appeals against his 2018 conviction in the Avenfield Apartments and Al-Azizia references. The division bench, consisting of Chief Justice Aamer Farooq and Justice Miangul Hassan Aurangzeb, is considering both appeals.
In the Avenfield properties corruption reference, Nawaz Sharif, who was the prime minister at the time, was sentenced to 10 years in jail for owning assets beyond known income and one year for not cooperating with the National Accountability Bureau. These sentences were to be served concurrently. In the Al-Azizia Steel Mills corruption reference, he was sentenced to seven years in jail, along with fines of Rs1.5 billion and US$25 million.
After being released from jail in March 2019, Nawaz left for London in November 2019 on medical grounds, as per the Lahore High Court’s permission. In December 2020, the Islamabad High Court declared him a proclaimed offender in both cases. He returned to the country last month and filed two separate applications for restoration of appeals against his conviction.
The court restored the appeals last month, and today Nawaz arrived in court for the hearing, accompanied by his brother Shehbaz Sharif and several senior PML-N leaders. During the proceedings, Nawaz’s lawyer requested four to six hours to present arguments, while the NAB prosecutor indicated that he would need approximately half an hour. The judge questioned whether NAB had nothing to say, signaling that more discussions were to follow.